Source: The Economic Times
NEW DELHI: Here’s one mobile phone application that most users might find too bugging—political SMS campaigns via mobile phones. Yet that’s what
unfolded in the recent elections. While the NSG commandos were fighting a pitched battle with terrorists in Mumbai last month, the country’s political parties were engaged in a high-pitched m-campaign, bombarding users with political messages on mobile phones. The recent election campaign in five states saw over 60 million mobile subscribers being spammed with about double the number of SMSes! Delhi alone witnessed about five million SMSes sent out by each of the main parties in the fray. And many messages were sent without scrubbing the Do Not Call (DNC) Registry list. According to the watchdog, Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), spamming mobile phones of registered subscribers is illegal. If a public interest litigation is filed against them the parties may have to shell out lot of money as compensation. Taking an average of Rs 1,000 per incident, for just about one crore SMSes (far more were sent out), the size of the penalty on political parties reaches to about Rs 1,000 crore! However value added services (VAS) providers who were engaged to send the political messages said they had scrubbed the data. One97 Communication CEO, Vijay Shekhar Sharma said: “On an average, two SMSes per person were sent by each party. We have worked for all the political parties and sent out close to 50 million messages. We have scrubbed numbers from DNC and have sent out messages only to those numbers which are not registered. The parties have spent close to 6% of their total budget in this mode of promotion.” In contrast, the CEO of one of the leading SMS sending websites said that: “The mode these parties have used is illegal and their basic modus operandi was spamming. The parties did not scrub numbers with DNC registry and sent messages to people irrespective of whether they are registered with DNC or not. More than 50 lakh SMSes were sent out by each party. This apparently is banned following the scam when some messages were sent out defaming the ruling party (Congress). The parties approached us too but we refused simply because of the legal angle attached to it.” Political parties however plead ignorance. Speaking to ET, Delhi BJP unit chief Dr Harshvardhan said: “SMSes were mostly sent by party members to inform others about party meetings and announcements. However we need more clarity on it.” Congress spokesperson Abhishek Manu Singhvi declined to comment on the issue. Another major bulk messaging and VAS provider Valuefirst said that it scrubbed all data through the DNC database which has about one crore out of 30 crore mobile subscribers in India. “We provide application tools to independents and political parties which they can integrate with a simple spreadsheet or database, to send them SMSes,” said a Valuefirst spokesperson.
A TRAI source however said that implicating a candidate in the fray will be very difficult as a mobile operator can take action only by
disconnecting a line, and they are not regular telemarketers. “We are deliberating on this technical issue as anybody can send any anti-national SMS to a large population and get away by just discarding the SIM. With IP based communication, tracing a sender becomes difficult sometimes.” There are divergent views on the legality as well. Internet and Mobile Association of India president Subho Ray maintains that it’s a violation of law if a candidate sends a SMS to a voter registered with the Do Not Call Registry. But a Delhi-based telecom analyst Mahesh Uppal offers another view. “These messages are a nuisance. However, these cannot be treated as a violation of a norm since the DNC has no mechanism to deal with non-telemarketing operators. The power to act in this case lies only in the hands of the Election Commission,” he said.
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